The Virginia Capitol (Graham Moomaw/Virginia Mercury)
In Congress, elected representatives are supposed to keep their taxpayer-funded offices mostly separate from their political campaigns. In the part-time Virginia General Assembly, rules walling off legislative offices from campaign activity are less clear.
The congressional rule exists to prevent incumbents from using government resources, including staff time, to help win reelection or move up to a higher office. Congressional staffers can engage in political activity, but only on their own time, without pressure from their boss and without their official duties being altered to free them up for campaign-related work, according to guidance published by the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Ethics.
In one of Virginia’s congressional primary races, the campaign website for Sen. Suhas Subramanyam, D-Loudoun, previously listed the names of five people working as campaign staff. Four of those five — the finance director, field director, outreach director and finance assistant — were also identified as publicly funded legislative staffers for Subramanyam this year on the Virginia Senate website.
However, no campaign-side pay for those four Senate staffers has been disclosed on Subramanyan’s federal campaign finance reports. That setup, as well as the broad overlap between Subramanyam’s government staff and political staff, has raised questions about how his campaign is handling compensation for staffers doing double duty.
Subramanyam’s campaign said two of the Senate staffers are being paid for their campaign work, and explained that campaign pay for those two employees didn’t appear as standalone costs because the money is being routed through the consulting firm of Subramanyam’s campaign manager, Ajay Mohan.
Mohan’s company, Rocket Science Strategies LLC, was paid $7,200 by Subramanyam’s campaign on Feb. 12, according to federal records detailing Subramanyam’s campaign expenses from last November through March 31. Campaign pay for Subramanyam’s Senate staffers is coming out of that $7,200 sum, the campaign said.
“Our campaign has complied with all laws and regulations, and no state funds or resources have been used to benefit the campaign in any way,” Mohan said in a statement.
Subramanyam’s campaign suggested the important-sounding political titles for the four staffers don’t necessarily mean they’ve been spending a lot of time on paid or unpaid political work.
“We’re happy to give both volunteers and staff campaign titles in the hope that helps in their careers,” Mohan said.
Subramanyam is one of several General Assembly members seeking the Democratic nomination in Northern Virginia’s 10th District, where incumbent Rep. Jennifer Wexton, D-Loudoun, isn’t seeking reelection because of health issues. Wexton endorsed Subramanyam earlier this month, giving him a boost in the 12-person Democratic primary to succeed her in a district that leans blue.
Staffers who have had legislative jobs are also doing campaign work for other General Assembly members running for Congress this year, and it’s not uncommon for legislative staffers to help their bosses keep their seats in General Assembly election years. But unlike Subramanyam’s campaign thus far, other candidates’ paperwork usually shows campaign payments to staffers doing campaign work.
Two people who have had legislative roles in the office of Del. Dan Helmer, D-Fairfax — who is competing with Subramanyam in the 10th District Democratic primary — have also done political work, according to Helmer’s campaign.
One former legislative staffer for Helmer left that job about halfway through the 2024 General Assembly session to take a role on Helmer’s political team, the campaign said. Helmer’s legislative chief of staff is also helping with the campaign and is being paid for that work from Helmer’s campaign account.
“We take the compliance issue seriously and are ensuring that when any employee does work for a different entity or office, they are paid for their corresponding work by that entity,” said Helmer campaign manager Brendon Mills.
Virginia doesn’t appear to have any detailed laws or guidelines on how legislators should handle employees who work on both the official side and the campaign side. A National Conference of State Legislatures summary of state laws on political activity by legislative employees lists Virginia as one of just three states with “no relevant statutes found” on the issue.
Many other states have laws specifying that legislative employees can’t engage in political activity during official work hours or in government buildings, according to the NCSL.
Ethics guidelines laid out by the U.S. House of Representatives say congressional staffers who engage in campaign work should “keep careful records of the time they spend on official activities and, separately, on campaign activities, and demonstrate that campaign work was not done on official time.”
U.S. House rules also say members can’t film political ads in government offices, because the space itself is considered an official resource that can’t be used for campaign purposes.
That issue too has been implicated in Virginia lawmakers’ campaigns this year, after Sen. Jennifer Boysko, D-Loudoun, released a political ad featuring shots of her in the publicly funded General Assembly Building. The commercial shows Boysko, who is also running in the 10th District primary, walking inside the building and sitting at a desk in her government office.
“It’s perfectly normal and proper to reference Jennifer’s work representing 200,000 Loudoun County voters in the State Senate when explaining why she will be the best congresswoman, whether that reference is in text or video,” said Boysko campaign manager Shaun Daniels.
Those shots of Boysko wouldn’t be allowed if the senator were to win her race and move up to a congressional office.
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